What does this mean?
Control measures are actions and/or activities that are taken to prevent, eliminate or reduce the occurrence of a hazard that you have identified.
How is this stage achieved?
Only significant hazards (those above your predetermined significance score trigger point) will be carried forward to this stage.
For each significant hazard record what actions and/or activities are to be taken to prevent, eliminate or reduce the hazard to an acceptable level.
Control measures are often confused with monitoring. Monitoring is carried out to check that the control measure put in place to control the hazard is working. Here are the definitions of “control measure” and “monitoring” to help you understand the difference:
Control measure
Any action and/or activity that can be used to prevent or eliminate a food safety hazard or reduce it to an acceptable level.
Monitoring
Conducting planned observations or measurements to assess whether a CCP is under control.
You should remember that:
- More than one control measure may be necessary to effectively manage a specific hazard. For example, use of a metal detection system, maintenance of the detection system, and training on using it might all be needed to avoid the hazard of metal pieces in food.
- One control measure may manage more than one hazard. For instance, oil temperature and fry time can be an effective control for reducing both numbers of Salmonella and Campylobacter in fried food.
- Control measures are not always carried out at the same Process Step where the hazard arises. For example a hazard at Process Step 1 may be ‘presence of metal in raw material from supplier’; this may have several controls including the use of only pre-approved suppliers, or supply to an agreed specification. These controls will appear at Process Step 1, however a control measure at Process Step 15 ‘effective working metal detector and rejection system’ is also a control for this hazard.
| Step number | Process step description | Hazard and possible cause | Control measure | Monitoring |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 10 | Deep frying | Survival of bacteria due to undercooking: low oil temperature or short exposure time | Stated oil temperature and fry time |
Checks on the continual measurement of oil temperature to be taken on the first product at the start of the shift, every 30 minutes thereafter and on the last product of the shift. Timer with alarm to be activated as each batch is placed in the fryer |
| 15 | Metal detection | Introduction of metal from broken machinery used in other process steps | Effective working metal detector and rejection system |
Metal detector checks taken at the start of a run, end of a run and every 20 minutes. The checks are carried out using 1.5mm Ferrous, 2.0mm Non-Ferrous and 3.0mm Stainless Steel, all are to be detected and rejected by the metal detector |
| 15 | Metal detection | Introduction of metal from broken machinery used in other process steps | Prerequisite requirement of Planned preventative maintenance | Routine maintenance will be carried out as outlined in the Planned preventative maintenance procedure PPM01 |
| 15 | Metal detection | Introduction of metal from broken machinery used in other process steps | Prerequisite requirement of Training | All staff in must be trained in operation and checking of the metal detector |